The present invention relates generally to printing systems, and printing method using the printing systems, and particularly to a printing system and printing method using the printing system for printing a Web page on the Internet. The “Web page” is made up of characters, images, movies, sounds, and other data files, displayed by a World Wide Web (WWW) browser, and composed/described in Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML).
Among printers suitable for the inventive printing system is, for example, a page printer. The “page printer” is a printer that composes a full page of data before printing the page. Print data is transmitted between a host computer and the page printer typically using a page description language (PDL), which is a kind of programming languages. The most page printers may also support several printer control codes (PCCs) in order to maintain compatibility with old application programs. The page printer includes a CPU and a memory, and a PDL or PCC received from the host computer is converted into an image in the CPU and temporarily stored in the memory, and then printed out.
Although a description will be given of the page printer as an exemplified embodiment of the present invention, printers other than the page printer such as a line printer and a serial printer are not precluded from application of the present invention. The present invention is suitable for a printing system provided with a local area network (LAN) interface connectible with the Internet via a router or the like, and the page printer.
The Internet is a global network environment consisting of some interlinked basic networks. Through the Internet, e-mails are exchanged, Web pages are published using the distributed information system called WWW, discussions are delivered via newsgroup services, and files are distributed via file transfer protocol (FTP) services.
Such information providing services utilizing the Internet have been rapidly penetrating in recent years into society in general. Users may search and browse Web page information on the Internet using a WWW browser such as the Internet Explorer, the Netscape Navigator, or the like. On the other hand, the demand for printing a desired page on the WWW has been increasing.
A computer for browsing Web pages is connected with WWW servers, printers, and other peripheral equipment, for example, via a network system or LAN. The LAN is comprised of a client computer, a server computer, a network OS, a LAN adaptor, a LAN cable, a router, and the like, and makes it possible to share resources such as a hard disk, printer, and the like, to use various kinds of groupware systems such as an e-mail system, a scheduling system, and the like, to share databases, and to establish and utilize intranets. The client computer is the computer for browsing Web pages.
When a user wishes to print a Web page displayed in his/her client computer, which is connected with a WWW server and a printer via a LAN as described above, the user operates the computer and presses a print button on the WWW browser that displays the Web page to be printed. A print command is generated through this operation, and the client computer converts data making up the Web page into page description language (PDL) format, and transmits the PDL-format data to the printer. Thereafter, the CPU in the printer receives, analyzes, and converts the PDL data into bitmap data (imaging data format). Then, the bitmap data is temporarily stored in the memory of the printer, and printed out.
However, conventional techniques as described above would require a wait after the user presses the print button and the print command is generated until processes in the printer like receiving, analyzing, and converting data are complete, thereby keeping the user waiting to receive a desired printed output. The wait means at least time it takes for the printer that has received PDL data to finish converting the data into bitmap data. Some browsers require a user to maintain his/her computer's connection with the Internet during the wait, and thus need communications costs for extra access time. Accordingly, the conventional processes of printing a Web page have disadvantages in high-speed processing and communications costs during the wait.